Facing Inadequacies
by Marcus S. Lazarus
Summary: Post-'The Parts in the Sum of the Whole', Booth's request for reassignment forces Brennan to confront the consequences of her rejection
1. Reassignment

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing, naturally

**Feedback: **I'm interested, believe me

AN: My take on the aftermath of the events of "The Parts in the Sum of the Whole"; I warn you in advance that it's going to be a BIT harsh on both Booth and Brennan, but I just cannot shake the feeling that Booth at least should have a LOT more issues with Brennan's decision than we've seen so far (I can certainly think of how _I'd _feel if I'd been in his shoes).

Facing Inadequacies

When she looked back on it in the aftermath, Doctor Temperance Brennan always found herself wondering if there'd been some signs that it was going to happen that she might have missed. Booth cutting back on the time they spent together outside of cases could be attributed to his attempt to focus on his new relationship- although he rarely actually talked about how things were progressing with , Brennan assumed that he'd bring it up when he wanted to-, and his own apparent reluctance to discuss her own personal life outside of Sweets's continuing sessions could be explained as simply him staying out of personal matters; she might miss their old conversations in the diner, but she had no reason to suspect there was a problem.

Then came the moment when the sound of someone walking into the lab prompted Brennan to turn around to greet her partner, only to see that it wasn't him standing there at all.

"Agent Perotta?" Brennan said, looking at the female agent in confusion.

"Doctor Brennan, hi," Perotta replied, smiling slightly uncertainly at the anthropologist. "Sorry to just drop in like this, but it was all rather last-minute; a body was discovered in-"

"Where's Booth?" Brennan asked, walking away from the body she was currently studying to stand more directly in front of Perotta. "Is something wrong?"

"Booth?" Perotta repeated, looking at Brennan in confusion. "Doctor Brennan, Agent Booth's request for reassignment was completed last night; didn't he tell you?"

For a moment, Brennan thought she hadn't heard the other woman correctly.

Booth had been reassigned...

He wasn't working at the Jeffersonian any more...

He wasn't working with _her _any more...

And he'd _asked_ for it?

"Hold on a minute; Booth never told _anyone _here about any request for reassignment," Cam said, walking over to join Brennan as the rest of the 'squint squad'- she'd never been sure when she started thinking of her team as that- gathered around behind her. "Why would he do that?"

"He just cited 'irreconcilable differences' and left it at that; it's not like anyone really needs to know _why _he wanted reassignment..." Perotta said, looking uncomfortably at the group of people gathered before her. "He asked for reassignment, there was no reason to find out why he wanted it, so the forms have all been filled out; we assumed that he'd discussed it-"

"Wendell?" Brennan said, looking back at her current intern.

"Uh... yeah?" Wendell Bray replied uncertainly.

"You're going with Agent Perotta," Brennan said simply, turning around to head for her office. "I have... other things I need to do."

"Doctor Brennan-" Agent Perotta began, moving to walk after the anthropologist only for Cam, Hodgins and Angela to move in just the right manner to block her progress as Wendell headed back up to the lab to collect the fieldwork kit.

"Strictly speaking, if Doctor Brennan doesn't wish to accompany you on this assignment at this time, you have no legal authority to make her do so," Cam said simply as she looked at Perotta. "Wendell Bray is fully capable of performing any on-site assessments you might wish to make, and Doctor Brennan will naturally be fully available when the body is brought back to the Jeffersonian if more detailed analysis is required; in the meantime, if she has... personal business... that she wishes to attend to, the only person with the right to object is me."

"And after all the overtime she's put in over the years, there's not that much chance of _that _happening, right?" Angela put in, looking over at Cam with a slight smile as Brennan hurried past them, barely registering the conversation beyond a brief, grateful nod at her colleagues before she was out of the lab and heading for her car.

* * *

As soon as she reached Booth's office, the turmoil that had dominated her thoughts almost since she first heard Perotta's news- it had taken more effort than she'd ever imagined she'd need to remain focused simply while driving to the FBI building; she just couldn't stop herself from picturing what she'd miss if Booth wasn't part of her life any more- faded as soon as she saw him, casually sitting behind his desk, going over various forms as though it was just another day at the office rather than the day when he'd completely thrown her life in upheaval by taking away the first constant thing she'd had ever since her parents died (Angela, for all that she loved the other woman like a sister, was too flighty for Brennan to feel like she'd made a _serious _commitment to her, and she'd only really begun to connect with the rest of the staff thanks to Booth)...

"Doctor Brennan?" Booth said, looking up from his paperwork as she walked into the room, slamming the door behind her and shooting him a brief glare as she lowered the blinds over the glass walls and door of the office before she turned to face him directly (Whatever was going to happen here, Brennan knew already that she didn't want anyone to witness it; the way in which he'd said her name alone told her this wasn't going to be an easy discussion). "What are-?"

"You _requested reassignment_?" Brennan hissed at him as she leaned over his desk to glare at him, trying to keep her voice down despite the rage she was currently feeling.

"You heard already?" Booth responded, the slight surprise in his voice the first emotion he's shown upon seeing her. "I didn't think you'd have a case this fast-"

"Oh, so you were just going to _sneak away_?" Brennan said, forcing the tears that threatened to cloud her eyes at the thought of Booth being gone away by focusing on her anger instead. "What the _hell _were you thinking; that I'd just-?"

"Compartmentalise and move on?" Booth interjected, his eyes narrowing slightly as he looked at her. "Why wouldn't you; I'm not dead, you'd only need to ask Hacker to learn where I was, I'd tell you when the transfer came through-"

"_Transfer_?" Brennan practically hissed, barely stopping herself from grabbing her suddenly-ex-partner by the shoulders and shaking him at that revelation. "You're leaving _Washington_?"

"Why not?" Booth said bluntly. "I got an offer a while back to teach a few pointers to some of the new guys in the Denver office; it seemed like as good a time as any to take it up when I'm still fit enough to demonstrate them."

"As good a time as any?" Brennan repeated incredulously. "What about Doctor Bryar-?"

"We ended things a fortnight ago- things weren't going anywhere- so I requested the reassignment," Booth said briefly. "If that's all, Doctor Brennan-"

"_Booth_..." Brennan whispered, shaking her head as she stared desperately at him, trying to figure out the best way to ask why he was doing this without making her real feelings obvious- he didn't _deserve _her, he deserved so much _more _than her-, "please... you... you can't leave... don't _do _this to me-"

At those words, something inside Booth seemed to snap.

"For God's sake, _stop making this about yourself_!" he yelled, standing up to glare at her from the opposite side of his desk, the two practically nose-to-nose as they glared at each other. "Not _everything _has to be defined by how it affects _you_! Your brother didn't cope with your parents vanishing any better than you did, your parents missed you even if they thought you were safer _without _them... God, you are _not _the only person in the world who's suffered! Sometimes people have to do what's best for _them _even if other people get hurt by it; I have to think about _me _for once, and this is the only way I can think of staying even _slightly _sane!"

"You said you wouldn't leave-!" Brennan began.

"_I lied_!" Booth yelled back, unconcerned about whoever might be listening in at this point; if Brennan wanted to talk about this in private, she should have come to him at his apartment rather than here. "I thought I could get through it, but we can't _all _'disassociate' ourselves from our emotions, _Doctor Brennan_; you think I haven't _tried_ that?! God, I tried to understand your reasoning, but there's no giant 'rewind' button for life; I can't..."

His voice trailed off as he looked at her, his anger seeming to dissipate slightly as he took in the gleaming trace of tears in the corner of her eyes. After a moment of silence, Booth sighed and stood back, taking a couple of deep breaths to calm himself down before he continued talking.

"I got why you said... what you said... at the time," he said, his voice slow as he spoke, his eyes somehow moving around the office without ever looking directly at her. "I thought that I could cope... I didn't want to pressure you... but I can't... _God_..."

He groaned as he sat back down behind his desk, staring up at the ceiling with a defeated slump to his posture that even Brennan's limited knowledge of body language had no trouble reading. "You broke my heart, and I can't even fucking _hate _you; the only person I hate is _me_..."

_What_? Brennan thought, confused at the sudden apparent shift in topic; what did she have to do with Booth suddenly feeling an apparently inexplicable self-loathing?

"And I..." Booth continued, ignorant of Brennan's confusion as he leant forward, Brennan quickly shifting her face to avoid reflecting her uncertainty. "I can't stay here, working with you... _looking _at you... _loving _you... when all it does is make me feel like crap..."

Brennan blinked.

"What?" she said, looking at him in confusion. "I... I don't know what that-"

"Oh, come _on_; you _cannot _tell me you don't understand _that_!" Booth yelled, cutting her off as he stood back up, his previously-displayed pain seeming pushed aside in favour of his new anger, glaring at her with a stare so intense that Brennan actually felt something she'd never thought she would ever associate with Seeley Booth; she actually felt afraid. "You met that 'David' guy online and dated him for almost four _months _before he broke it off because you got 'too focused on your work' during your mom's case, you and Sully had _one _case together and you were thinking of leaving for a year with him a month later, you've been dating Hacker for the last few months after barely meeting him more than a few times before the _first _date..."

"Saying 'more than a few times'..." Brennan began, before she shook her head in self frustration as she stared back at Booth with renewed urgency. "That doesn't matter, Booth; they don't _mean _anything-"

"No, they don't," Booth said bluntly.

For a moment, Brennan's hopes soared, but then she took in the grim expression on Booth's face and couldn't shake the feeling that she'd just kicked a puppy or had denied Parker a treat (And why did Parker spring to mind before her own step-nieces?).

"They just mean," Booth finished, his voice actually sounding like he was trying to stop himself from crying a little at this point, "that, as far you're concerned, you'd rather give some guy you've only just _met_ a shot... before you'd even _look _at me that way."

After another moment's silent staring at each other, Booth finally sat down in his chair, his head lowered as he waved at the door.

"Just... just _go_," he said simply, a defeated tone in his voice that made it clear that he'd said all he had to say on that topic. "I've... got some forms to finish."

Unable to think of anything else to say to that- and with Booth's body language making it clear that he had no interest in continuing the conversation-, Brennan turned around and walked out of Booth's office, closing the door behind her.

As she turned to stare silently at the new barrier between her and the man she'd come to depend on more than any other, she couldn't stop herself from thinking of the symbolism of this latest development.

She'd never attached any meaning to the idea of symbolism in her life before this moment, but right now, she felt as though the door being closed like that had permanently closed the door on the part of her life involving Seeley Booth...

And she still couldn't quite understand why; what had she _done_ to make Booth hate _himself_ so much whenever he looked at her?

If he'd hated her for rejecting him, she could understand that, but he'd made it clear that he only hated _himself_...

* * *

AN 2: Yes, I know I'm evil; if you want to see more, reviews are required...


	2. Reassessment

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing, naturally

**Feedback: **I'm interested, believe me

AN: Thanks for the positive reviews for the last chapter; I hope this one continues to maintain your interest

Facing Inadequacies

When Angela first received Brennan's tearful phone call an hour or so after Brennan had originally walked out of the Jeffersonian, she hadn't been sure what to make of it- she couldn't even remember the last time _Brennan_ of all people had asked her to skip work-, but with her having pretty much completed her sketch of the victim's face already, and the cause of death fairly obvious to determine, Cam had willingly allowed her to go and check out the Jeffersonian's top doctor's current state, Angela swiftly departing to meet Brennan at her apartment.

It was only when Brennan opened the door to reveal reddened eyes and pale skin that made it fairly obvious that she'd been crying that Angela started to get anxious; after everything Brennan had been through in her life, anything that could make her cry was definitely something to be worried about.

"Angela..." Brennan said, smiling warmly at her friend as she showed her into her apartment, Angela sitting on a couch while Brennan sat in a nearby chair. "Thanks for.... well, thanks for coming; I know it's a bit... impulsive, what with you having a case and all..."

"Eh, it's all pretty straightforward back at the lab anyway; it was just some body in an alleyway and the leg and neck damage made it fairly easy to work out that the guy jumped and hit his head while falling down," Angela said dismissively (As tragic as the guy's suicide was, right now she'd finished her role in solving it by working out how the guy had died, and now she had a more immediate problem to deal with). "Anyway, what's bothering you?"

"Well..." Brennan began, giving the impression that she wished she was anywhere other than where she was right now. "I... I found out why Booth's leaving the Jeffersonian; we had a... talk... a while back..."

"Hold on; Booth's leaving because you guys had a 'talk'?" Angela repeated, looking at her friend in confusion. "What happened?"

"He..." Brennan began, sniffing slightly before she continued. "Essentially, Booth... he told me he loved me."

Despite the tearful expression on her friend's face when she made that statement, Angela couldn't stop the excited squeal that erupted from her at that news.

"_Sweetie_!" she said, grinning at her friend as her eyes lit up. "That's _great_! Y'see, I _told _you there was-"

"I turned him down," Brennan cut in.

Angela blinked.

"What?" she said, looking at her friend as though Brennan had suddenly grown another head and was now talking a different language without any sign that these changes were in any way unusual to anyone watching her from outside. "I'm sorry, I thought you said that _Seeley Booth _told you that he _loved _you, and you turned him _down_; I'm not exactly getting the _why _of that decision here..."

"I... I can't _change _for him, Angela," Brennan said, looking up at her friend slightly uncertainly. "He asked me for a chance... he expressed an... interest... in the possibility of a date, but I... I can't be what he _needs_... I don't know how-"

"Sweetie, I love you and respect you, but right now, I have one thing to say to you; _shut. Up_," Angela interrupted, her eyes narrowing slightly as she looked at her friend. "I never thought I'd say this, but... I actually have to agree with Booth on this one."

Brennan could only blink at that.

"Wh... what?" she said, staring in confusion at her friend. "But Angela, I can't be what he-"

"Bren, right now you _really _don't want to say anything to me on that topic because I _might _be tempted to do something I've never done and hit you for being an idiot," Angela said simply, looking at her friend with as cold a stare as Brennan had ever seen Angela direct to anyone. "You're telling me that you had a gorgeous, dedicated guy like Booth 'essentially'- which I'm guessing means that he did everything but expressly _say _the three words in question- tell you that he _loved _you, and you turned him down because you 'didn't think you could be what he wanted'? The man has spent the last _five years _in pretty much constant proximity to you during everything from you finding your mother's bones to dealing with your dad being on trial for the murder of his own boss; I think it's safe to say at this point that Booth knows what you're like, and the fact that he actually _asked _you if you wanted to take things a step further seems to suggest that he's fairly sure you _can _be what he needs..."

"It's... relationships can't _change _like that, Angela," Brennan said weakly, unsure at this point if she was trying to convince her friend or herself; the more she looked back at what she'd said to Booth the more she was starting to question herself in a manner she hadn't done after making a decision for years. "There's too many expectations, too many variables; I... I don't even understand what I did to make him leave _now_, how can I expect to keep him happy in-?"

"Back up a minute, I think we jumped a topic here; you're saying that this whole 'reassignment' thing he's pulled on us was because of _you_?" Angela asked, holding up a hand to halt Brennan before she could go any further. "Are you sure about that, Sweetie? I mean... did he actually _say_ something to make you think that, or is this just you freaking out?"

For a short time, Brennan merely sat in silence, staring at the table before her, before she finally continued to talk.

"He said that... I went to see him at his office when I left, and... and he told me... he couldn't stay with someone who made him hate _himself_," Brennan said; for a brief moment Angela thought that she was about to start crying again, but then she collected herself again and the moment passed. "He said that he'd tried to stay even after I told him that I... I couldn't be what he wanted... he said we could still work together... and then I went to see him today and he just started _yelling _about how he couldn't keep putting his life on hold for me... he couldn't keep going into work and seeing someone who made him hate himself..."

"Hold on, he _hates _himself?" Angela interjected; this story was starting to become increasingly confusing the more she heard about it. "Why did he say that?"

"Something about how..." Brennan began, before she took a deep breath and continued, a frustrated glare on her face that was evidently caused by her confusion regarding the current topic. "Basically, he just started listing some examples of my previous dating history and talking about how little I'd known them before I'd started dating them and how I'd never looked at him- which didn't make sense; I _have _looked at-"

"Gotcha," Angela said, cutting her off with an exasperated stare. "Sweetie, you _really _didn't get it?"

"The correlation between my dating history and Booth hating himself?" Brennan said, looking impatiently at Angela for clarification. "No, I didn't, Angela; I thought I'd made that clear-"

"God, did you even stop to _think_ about what he said?" Angela asked, rolling her eyes in exasperation before she returned her attention to staring pointedly at her friend. "Look, I'm not saying you're... _easy_ or anything like that when it comes to you and guys- most of the time your attitude is just you seeing something you want and you going for it, and that's good normally-, but Booth did make a point; when you basically just dived into a relationship with Sully after working with him on one case, went out with Jared just after meeting him- and having not really heard _anything _about him from Booth before then-, and then go and completely shoot Booth down without even giving him a chance to see how just _one _date between you two would go after you've worked with him on... I don't even _know _how many cases..."

"Uh... what's the point of this?" Brennan asked, looking apprehensively at her friend as she trailed off, the expression on her face making it clear to the anthropologist that she wasn't going to like what she was about to hear.

"Bren..." Angela said, looking at her friend with a grim expression, almost unable to believe that someone as smart as Doctor Temperance Brennan couldn't see where she was going with this. "You're basically telling Booth that he's worthless."

"_What_?" Brennan said, looking at Angela incredulously. "That's ridiculous; I've _never_ made him-"

"Y'know, even if we forget that whole mess with Jared, you can't exactly argue with the fact that you gave yourself a chance at a relationship with Sully based on a lot less evidence that you'd get along with him than you've got for something working out with you and Booth," Angela pointed out. "Seriously, Bren, when you're willing to go out on dates with guys you've only just met and aren't even willing to go out on _one _date with Booth- not an undercover thing but an actual, leisurely _date_- after you've known him for five years, _especially_ after the guy just- from what you've said- basically poured his heart out to you, you know what that seems like?"

Brennan shook her head, a slightly apprehensive expression on her face as she looked at her friend, a part of her already sure of the answer she was about to hear no matter how much she didn't want to hear the words spelled out.

"You're basically telling Booth that you already know you _can't _feel that way about him so he isn't worth the bother of even one date because you don't see him as anything more than the guy who's there," Angela said simply.

"_NO_!" Brennan yelled, her voice emphasised by her unwilling sob before she regained control of herself. "I _told _Booth why I wouldn't-"

"No offence, Sweetie, but from Booth's perspective, if you were that certain that you didn't have the kind of heart he was looking for, you shouldn't even bother _dating _in the first place; you can let other people in, but if you remembered what you said accurately you basically as good as told him that you won't let _him _in," Angela said bluntly; right now what Brennan needed was a direct confrontation rather than any attempts to sugar-coat what she had to understand at this point. "You can dress it up as protecting him all you like, but in the end, from what I'm hearing from about what he heard from you, as far as Booth's concerned, when you're willing to date all these other guys just after meeting him and you're not willing to give him a chance after this long, you're basically saying to him 'Thanks for being there for me all these years; now back off before you get annoying'."

"I _told_ him why I did it; I _can't be what he_-" Brennan began weakly.

"I draw attention back to my earlier point; when the guy's been around you for the last five years, I think it's _pretty_ safe to say that he knows enough about you to know if you're what he's looking for or not," Angela pointed out, cutting her friend off with another piercing glare. "If Booth wants to be with you after he's seen you in every condition from cutting the skin off a dead guy's hand to wear it like a glove to helping you deal with the fact that you killed a guy _and_ that your parents were crooks, I can't really think of something you could do _now _that would make him ditch you; right now, as far as he's concerned, if you don't want to be with him even after all that you've gone through together, it's not that much of a stretch for him to decide that you aren't interested because you don't think he's worth it."

For a moment, Angela briefly thought about bringing up what that rejection could have done for Booth's confidence on a more long-term scale given his issues after his recent brain surgery, but stopped herself from actually voicing it; any thoughts she might have on Booth's mental state after that tumour would be speculation at best, and as unhappy as she was with her friend for what she'd done to Booth she wasn't quite angry enough to give her friend something like _that_ to feel guilty over...

"Think about it, Bren," she said simply as she stood up. "Do you _really _want him to walk out of your life thinking that you think he's the loser Jared once told you he was?"

With that parting comment, Angela turned around to walk out of the apartment, leaving Brennan alone with her thoughts; as much as Angela might sympathise with Booth's plight, right now what Brennan did after their last discussion was all up to her, and Angela had already given Brennan everything she needed to think about to realise what everyone else around them had already recognised long ago.

* * *

For the second time that day, Brennan did something that she never fully understood when she looked back on the events that had taken place in their aftermath.

All she could clearly recall feeling after Angela's departure was a sudden, desperate need to take her mind off Booth- a need to think about something, _anything_, other than the turbulent feelings she now found herself facing in the prospect of his imminent absence from her life and Angela's words still ringing in her ears-, prompting her to call Hacker for an impulsive night out- although he arranged the restaurant; she'd requested that she wanted to be 'surprised' in the hopes of finding something to _stop _her thinking about Booth- at some restaurant where she could barely even remember what she ate (Always wondering what Booth would have made of it), followed by a club where she wasn't sure how much she danced or drank but was fairly certain that she could have managed on less of the second (Again curious about what Booth's opinion of the place would have been), and then they were back at her apartment, in her bed...

And _God_... as the last few months of her relationship with the man she was with came to a head, the two of them physically connecting in her bedroom at last...

All she could think about was a man whose heart she'd broken by trying to protect him, a man who'd stuck by her when she'd learned things about her past that even she hadn't believed or accepted at the time... the man who'd been the first constant in her life since that terrible Christmas long ago when she was fifteen... the man who'd taught her that it was OK to feel again... the man whose dedication to catching killers was matched only by his dedication to those he considered family... the man who was leaving her because she'd made him think he was worthless when he was the single most incredible man she'd ever known...

"BOOTH!" she yelled at the moment of climax, all thoughts of the tension between them forgotten; all that mattered for her was that he was there, he loved her, he'd seen her at her worst, he'd seen her at her best, he'd held her as she cried, he'd helped her cope with the experience of killing when she'd once sworn never to do such a thing, he knew who she was almost better than she knew herself in some ways, and he _still wanted to be with her_...

It was only after she came down from her earlier orgasmic high and registered that the man she had just shared it with had a far more prominent forehead than Booth did that she realised what she'd just done.

She wasn't sure if she should feel embarrassed or angry with herself at the moment- Andrew's reaction alone was going to be far from easy to deal with-, but somehow, even with the man she'd been dating for the last few months looking at her like she'd just stabbed him in the stomach, all she could feel was a strange elation at her recent revelation.

_Booth_...

At the moment of her peak, even without having shared any kind of similar experience with him, all she had been able to think of was _him_...

If it wasn't for the fact that she had some _serious _explaining to do before Andrew concluded that he had to terminate her partnership with Booth for unprofessional conduct- or maybe just out of simple jealousy at the idea that she'd been involved with Booth behind his back-, she would have been heading for his apartment already; as it was, it was next on her to-do list after straightening this problem out...

"Andrew..." she said at last, wishing- not for the first time- that she was better at social situations than she was (Even if she doubted that this kind of situation was something that came up on a regular basis) but determined to put any suspicions or questions Hacker might have to rest before he could even start asking them. "If it makes _any _difference, Booth and I haven't... _done _anything like... _this _yet- we aren't even dating right now-, but-"

"But you will be," Hacker said simply, finishing her sentence for her with a resigned smile, despite the slight gleam of embarrassed anger in his eyes at her recent declaration. "What changed?"

"I... had some time to think recently, and I... I realised some things I... wasn't ready to admit earlier," Brennan admitted briefly, looking down at the bed to avoid looking at Hacker; with thoughts of Booth running through her mind right now, looking at another man in this state seemed... _disloyal_, somehow. "I thought I could... I thought I _had _to... but then I... well, I realised I was wrong..."

She trailed off and shot him a brief, apologetic glance, taking care to keep her eyes only on his face. "I'm sorry you got involved in this; you're far from... inefficient... here, but..."

"Yeah, I think it's best you _don't _finish that sentence, Doctor Brennan," Hacker said, turning around slightly to indicate his clothes, a brief flash of embarrassment visible in his eyes before he forced it back down again. "I'll just... go, shall I?"

"If you could..." Brennan said, before another thought occurred to her. "And... as far as Booth and I... pursuing something further... goes, will it...?"

"Keep up your current solve rate and remain professional while on duty, and I can't see anyone having issues with you two continuing to work together while... dating... off-duty," Hacker said simply, before he turned back to look at her with an uncomfortable expression. "Just... don't mention... _this_ to him, could you?"

"Uh... mention what?" Brennan asked, hoping that she'd understood Angela's use of that term in this kind of situation accurately.

"Exactly," Hacker confirmed, smiling briefly at her before he got out of bed, Brennan turning away from him as he began to get dressed to give herself time to think.

_What _she was going to do next wasn't in question; what was in question was _how _she was going to do it...

* * *

AN 2: Hope that proved satisfactory; matters all come to a head next time...


	3. Reevaluation

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing, naturally

**Feedback: **I'm interested, believe me

Facing Inadequacies

As she stood outside the door of Booth's apartment the following night- according to Perotta his transfer papers weren't due to go through until the end of the week, but she had to get this done as quickly as possible-, Brennan once again wished that she could be anywhere other than here.

The previous day's work had been a difficult time for her even without the fact that she had spent most of her time trying to figure out what she should actually _say _to Booth when she went to see him that evening (She might have been tempted to visit him immediately after her revelation the previous night but this kind of thing required significantly more thought than she'd been displaying in her relationship with Booth these last few months); Angela's pointed glares at her hadn't exactly helped matters much, even if she'd apparently respected her privacy enough not to tell Hodgins what they'd discussed last night.

Brennan was just grateful that she'd had nothing more demanding to deal with than sorting through some of the bones remaining in limbo; she didn't know she'd react to seeing Perotta coming in again when she only wanted to see Booth come walking back through that door, knowing that their relationship was back on track after she'd pushed him away like this...

It was the first time she'd found herself _wishing _for something since that long-ago day when her parents had first vanished, and even then she'd known that it wouldn't do any good.

The only difference was that, the last time, she'd been totally _unable _to do _anything_, whereas this time she could do _something_; she just wasn't _comfortable _with it...

Finally, she reached the end of the day, signed the last of her paperwork for the current day, and then she was heading for the door, ignoring the surprised stares from Angela's office as Angela and Hodgins looked incredulously at the sight of her leaving the Jeffersonian on time rather than staying behind after closing-time. She briefly thought about telling Angela what she was up to, but decided against it; right now, she had something she needed to do, and she was _going _to do it on her own...

As soon as the door to Booth's apartment opened, all of Brennan's composure vanished at the sight of him staring at her, dressed in a partly unbuttoned shirt that gave the impression he had only put it on for his guest's sake and a grim expression in his eyes that left her worryingly reminded of the expression that had been there after Howard Epps had fallen to his death; even she could see that Booth looked like he was on the end of his metaphorical rope.

"I don't want you to go," Brennan said instantly, before he could react to her presence and shut the door without listening to her, only to be left feeling uncomfortably humiliated when Booth simply stared back at her.

"Little late for that, Doctor Brennan," he said at last as he turned back around to go back into his flat, only for Brennan to neatly step into his apartment before he could shut the door.

"No, it's not; you're still here, and I'm _not _leaving until you listen," she said, fighting down her emotions to stare at him directly (When in doubt, her best approach for her was to power on through anything he might try to say back to her). "You _can't _leave, Booth; I _need _you here-"

"Only because I'm the only agent you've met so far who's bothered to adapt to your way of doing things," Booth said dismissively, not even looking at her as he turned back to his fridge to pull out a beer. "You'll get along well enough with the new guy once you give him a shot, I'm sure; Hell, you'd probably end up _dating _the guy if past precedent's anything to go by-"

"Hold on; now you're thinking of _Sully_?" Brennan cut in, looking incredulously at her partner; she hadn't even thought about the former FBI agent in she didn't know how long, and Booth was bringing him up _now_? "Sully was a pleasant diversion, and I'm not denying we were compatible, but he was never _you_, Booth-"

"I noticed that, thanks; in case you hadn't noticed, that's part of the reason I _quit_," Booth retorted, glaring briefly at her before he took a sip of his beer and turned away. "The guy managed to get under your skin enough to get a date out of you after one case when I only got to work with you after our first one by getting you arrested at the airport-"

"I didn't leave with him because he wasn't _you_, Seeley!" Brennan yelled (She wasn't sure what surprised her more; the fact that she'd called Booth by his first name or the fact that she'd only just realised what she'd just said).

"I might have dated him because he'd _asked_ me," she continued (She wasn't sure where any of this was coming from- she'd certainly never thought about it herself before now-, but she was too emotional right now to even _try _to lie), "but I just wasn't able to commit to anything _serious _with him; I was only with him because I knew he couldn't _hurt _me-"

"And you think _I'm _going to?" Booth cut in, shooting another piercing glare at her that left Brennan with a momentary fear that Booth's tumour had returned and he was hallucinating that she was Howard Epps; the sheer _contempt _in his eyes...

Then she saw the pain behind them, and her illogical fear was ended; Booth knew who she was, it was just easier for him to focus on his _anger _towards her right now rather than allow himself to focus on any other feelings he might have...

"It's not _like _that!" Brennan yelled back, forcing aside both any thoughts of the deeper meanings of that last statement and the tears she felt in her eyes as a result of its implications; had she really hurt him that much? "Sully couldn't hurt me because I couldn't care about _him _the way I... feel about _you_; he was _safe_-!"

"OK, I get that you don't trust me on top of-" Booth began.

"That's not what I'm saying!" Brennan began again. "I want you to stay because I _need_-!"

"Goddamnit, Doctor Brennan, _quit with these fucking games_!" Booth yelled, throwing the can of beer off to the side as he turned around to look at her. "Why don't you just admit it; I'm only _convenient _to you, aren't I? I'm the guy you thought would _always_ be there, the one who'd just take all your _crap _no matter what you threw at me... and now you're just having trouble getting use to the idea that I'm sick of being your _doormat_!"

"You're _not _my doormat; you're-" Brennan began, her confusion clear on her face (What did Booth think she believed he had in common with a doormat?).

"NO!" Booth yelled again, cutting her off mid-sentence. "You don't get to _do that anymore_! You can't keep walking over my heart and just... _apologise _later and expect it to be back to normal! I can't fucking _do this anymore_; I can't keep... holding out for those moments when you compliment me in some... _squinty_ manner that means more to me than it does to you! I _have _to leave before you make me want to _shoot _myself-"

"NO!" Brennan screamed, unable to stop the sudden rush of terror she felt at the idea of Booth even _possibly _thinking about killing himself (Given his Catholic upbringing and the correlation between suicide and damnation, the fact that he even voiced that possibility increased her horror). "Booth, you _can't_-"

"Why shouldn't I; it's not like you cared the _last _time you thought I was dead!" Booth yelled back at her. "All that _crap _about being able to _compartmentalise_ and move on... God, I should have left _then_, that should have made it fucking _clear _to me that I mean nothing more to you than the guy you don't have to 'train'-"

"Hold on; I 'trained' you?" Brennan cut in, trying desperately to maintain some kind of control over the current conversation. "I've offered suggestions, but I've never _made _you do anything-"

"Oh, come on now, what was it you told Perotta back when you had to work with her when I was out of it due to that back problem?" Booth retorted. "Some crap about how it was easier working with someone you knew already rather than-?"

"That has _nothing _to do with why I need you, Booth!" Brennan yelled, fighting down the flash of anger she felt at having her own words thrown back at her; as much as it hurt to hear Booth hurl her own casual comments at her like the bullets he'd once fired at his enemies, she couldn't let herself back down when her relationship with him was at stake. "It's not _just _because you know how we work-"

"Y'know, I might have believed that once, but that stopped being me a _long _time ago," Booth spat back at her. "I kidded myself that you liked me for me when you insisted I stick around even after Kirby suspended me during that mess with your dad and Russ three years ago- I thought that the fact that you wanted me around when all I was contributing to the case was someone to hit the guy when you found him might mean _something_-, but you couldn't even come to my goddamn _funeral_ when you thought I'd _died _before Angela made you! I _really _mean a lot to you, don't I; you don't even bother to attend _my _funeral even after going to the funerals of complete _strangers _when you've only known them by their fucking _skeletons_!"

"I _did _care about you, Booth..." Brennan began tearfully.

"Yeah, I'm feeling the love here, Bones; according to Sweets, you 'compartmentalised' so effectively that I might as well have never _been _there in the first goddamn place," Booth practically growled at her. "How long did it take you to get past being told I was dead? A day? An hour? A-"

"_I didn't feel ANYTHING for the whole FORTNIGHT that you were dead_!" Brennan screamed, prompting Booth to pause mid-sentence as he looked at her in confusion.

"When you... when I was told that... you'd _died_..." she continued, simultaneously praying that she was anywhere other than here and refusing to give into her old fears about people running away from her if she showed them how she felt, "I... I couldn't even _think _of letting myself feel anything about it; it just... it _hurt _too much... I _missed _you so much..."

She paused for a moment, taking a deep breath as she reached over to take a tight hold of the nearest object- the back of a chair- to provide her with some degree of support as she continues.

"It was... it was easier to stop myself feeling anything... about _anything_... than to just let myself actually... _acknowledge _that you were gone," she said at last, looking tearfully up at him. "I stopped taking part in any offers of fieldwork... I stopped going to the diner... I was totally focused on going through _Limbo _rather than taking any dig offers or requests to analyse and identify other bodies... limbo was _methodical_... it was _safe_... I didn't _need _to care about anything more than finishing off what people had already done... digs and other work would have needed me to _care _about what I was doing... and I... I..."

She lowered her head even as she spoke, tears momentarily filling her eyes and clouding her vision before she looked back up at Booth, swallowing uncertainly as she forced down the part of her that wanted to just run away from the current discussion.

"It... it didn't _mean _anything without you there, Seeley," she said at last, barely registering her second use of his first name that night as she looked at him, wishing that she believed in something that she could pray to as she tried to find the right words for what she was about to say, hoping that the sincerity of what she was trying to say would make an impression even if the words were poorly selected. "It was so hard just to _breathe _sometimes when you weren't there... I had to do everything I could just to hold it together... it sometimes meant that I had to focus on feeling nothing if I was going to do _anything_..."

For a moment the two of them stood in silence, Brennan uncertain what would be the right thing to say next while Booth tried to process what he'd just heard, before Booth finally broke the silence.

"And... you felt like that... because...?" he asked, a slight hint of hope in his voice even as the rest of his body language made it clear that he was trying to hold that hope back in case she crushed it like she had earlier.

"Because..." Brennan began uncertainly, suddenly feeling more terrified than she had felt when she saw Epps's 'apprentice' standing over Booth with clearly every intention of killing him and knowing that she was the only person who could save him, "I... I..."

She paused for a moment, cursing her own discomfort with emotions- couldn't she get past it just this _once _for Booth-, but gritted her teeth and continued to talk as she stared at him.

"I still don't know if I _can_... love... someone the way you described it to me..." she said uncertainly, hoping that this would be enough to get through to him even if she still felt uncomfortable defining what she felt right now. "But... when I think about how I was when you were dead... and how I felt when you came back to me... whenever I look at you... whenever I think about what I'd miss most... whenever I think of somewhere I'm safe... whenever I think of someone I _trust_..."

She took another deep breath to prepare herself before she spoke again. "Whenever I look to the future... no matter what happens in it... no matter _what _we got through... I can't think of any circumstances that would change how I feel about you now."

"And... that is?" Booth asked after a moment's pause, looking at her slightly apprehensively.

"That I..." Brennan began, pausing as she stared at Booth once more, no idea what to say about her feelings for the man before her even as she knew that she had to, her near-limitless vocabulary failing her for once as she stared at the man who had come to mean so much to her, whose life had become so interwoven with hers over the last five years that she could barely remember what it had been like for him not to be there, the man who had shown her that it was all right to care about others, the man who had only ever come close to leaving her of his own free will due to her own mistakes...

"I..." she began again, swallowing slightly as tears threatened to brim over her eyes once again as she looked at him, knowing what she wanted to say but equally uncertain if it was the right time to say it (After she'd been so cruel to him earlier would he even _accept _her declaration if she made it now?)...

"Oh," Booth said, breaking her train of thought as he looked at her face, a slightly hesitant smile on his face as he looked at her. "You..."

Realising that, once again, her partner's skills at body language had surpassed what she could deduce herself, Brennan could only smile and nod, not trusting herself to speak through the fear that had briefly settled over her.

"I... I do," she said, nodding back at him. "I _never _thought you were worthless, Booth; I just... I didn't know _how _to respond to this... it was easier to say that I was trying to think of you than to admit that I was... was..."

"Scared," Booth finished for her, a neutral expression on his face as he stared at her. "You basically stomped all over my heart... because you were scared."

"I just... I always _worry _whenever I'm in relationships," Brennan admitted, trying to simultaneously avoid looking too closely at Booth and unwilling to take her eyes off him. "I try not to get too attached most of the time, but with you... I... I _can't_... you mean too much... I didn't want risk it... I'm not-"

"Hey," Booth said, stepping forward to place a tender finger over her lips, the gentleness of the action after the yelling that had taken place earlier such a sharp contrast that Brennan almost felt like crying at the tenderness of the gesture.

"You _are _worth it, Bones," he said as he looked at her with a tender smile that Brennan hadn't realised how much she'd been missing since that meeting in his office yesterday until now. "_Never _doubt that."

"Really?" Brennan asked, almost ashamed at the tearful uncertainty in her voice even as she swore her heart beat slightly faster at the warm smile Booth gave her (Or maybe it was the fact that he'd called her 'Bones' again)...

"Yeah..." Booth replied, nodding at her with a slight hesitation, as though he was slightly afraid to commit himself to this action even as he felt like he should. "You're worth it... I just-"

Brennan wasn't sure how she knew it was the right thing to do- intuition had always been Booth's 'thing' rather than hers-, but when she placed her finger on Booth's lips like he'd placed his on hers earlier, she couldn't deny how good the slight gleam in his eyes made her feel.

"You're worth it too, Booth," she said simply. "And I've... I've always believed in _you_... even if I've sometimes not believed in... how I feel..."

For a moment, silence filled the room after that last statement, each of them thinking about what had just been said and its implications for them in the long term, until Booth finally broke

"OK..." Booth said at last, now looking at her with the same slightly uncertain smile he'd had earlier, as though he wasn't sure if it was going to stay on his face for longer than the next few seconds. "If we're done with the 'yelling' portion of this evening... maybe we could... have dinner tomorrow?"

Brennan blinked.

"D... dinner?" she repeated.

"Well, I get the feeling that we've got a couple of things that would probably be something we'd be better off talking about over a decent meal, and I'm hoping we've settled anything we'd want to _yell _at each other about, so... dinner tomorrow?" Booth repeated, smiling slightly uncertainly at her. "I know this nice little place downtown if you want... maybe after work tomorrow?"

It wasn't an explicit apology for him making preparations to leave her, but Brennan wasn't going to kid herself by thinking that she deserved anything to be that easy after what she'd done to him; after breaking his heart like that, she should just be grateful that he was still interested in talking to her in the first place and leave it at that.

"O... OK," she said at last, allowing herself a brief smile. "So... after work?"

"Sounds good," Booth replied with a brief nod. "Just... wear something nice, OK? Not _too _smart, but-"

"Maybe smarter than usual?" Brennan finished for him with a confirming nod. "Of course."

She wondered how long it would take for her to hold down the urge to impersonate Angela and virtually squeal in glee until she no longer felt the urge to do so...


	4. Revelations

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing, naturally

**Feedback: **I'm interested, believe me

AN: Well, here's the last chapter; hope everyone enjoyed this story (Hope this all works out; I wanted to get this finished before the Season Five finale aired, so it might be a bit rushed)

Facing Inadequacies

"So..." Angela asked, standing outside Brennan's office, looking at her friend with a curious smile the next afternoon as closing-time drew nearer- Brennan had been too focused on her analysis earlier to be in a particularly talkative mood, although she'd slowed her pace enough to make Angela feel comfortable enough to approach her now-, noting her friend's neater-than-usual dark blue blouse and trousers- she hadn't exactly 'dressed up' for work, but she definitely looked smarter than normal-, "how'd things go with your 'chat' with Booth last night?"

"My chat with Booth?" Brennan repeated, looking up at Angela with an uncertain stare as though she really didn't know what her friend was talking about.

"Come on, sweetie; you leave _on time _after a chat like the one we had a couple of nights ago?" Angela asked, raising an eyebrow as she smiled at her friend. "Seriously, you spent yesterday going over stuff with the kind of grim science-y look on your face I haven't seen since we thought he was dead, and now here you are, actually _humming _to yourself a little bit while you work..."

"Really?" Brennan asked.

"'Hot Blooded', I believe," Angela replied with a brief smile before she walked over to sit casually on the side of her friend's desk, smiling quizzically at her. "So, spill; what happened with you and our resident Agent Hot Stuff?"

"We... we talked," Brennan replied at last.

"And?" Angela asked, waving a hand promptingly. "C'mon, you don't expect me to believe that you're that happy just because you _talked_, do you?"

"And... we're going to finish our conversation tonight at dinner," Brennan replied with a slight smile. "Booth's made the reservations, and he'll be picking me up-"

"Hold on; that's _it_?" Angela said, looking at her best friend incredulously. "You just... _talked_? Sweetie, this is _Booth_-"

"Exactly, Angela; it's _Booth_," Brennan replied, turning around to look directly at her friend. "What we're trying to do here isn't exactly simple; we've still got some things we need to talk about before we can... well, Booth's still straightening out the necessary paperwork to get himself reinstated as our liaison-"

"Reinstated?" Angela cut in, a smile spreading across her face at her friend's words. "As in, he's _not _being reassigned from his role here?"

"Let's just say that I've... spoken with a few people; what happens afterwards is all a matter of patience," Booth's voice said from the door, prompting Brennan and Angela to turn and look at the FBI special agent as he stood there, his tie for once a more straightforward black one and his suit looking more clean than usual. "Ready there, Bones?"

"As I'll ever be," Brennan replied, smiling warmly at Booth while trying to fight down the metaphorical butterflies in her stomach- she'd never realised just where that phrase came from until now; it really _did _feel like she had a mass of winged insects flying around inside her- as she turned off her computer and walked over to join him in the door.

"See you tomorrow, Angela," Booth added, nodding briefly at the artist as Brennan took his offered arm.

"Hold on; tomorrow?" Angela asked, looking between the two with a smile. "As in..."

"As in, Booth and I have a few things to talk about and we're talking about them over dinner at a restaurant he knows," Brennan replied with a slight smile. "You'll find out how it goes later."

As the two of them walked off towards the Jeffersonian's main entrance, Brennan glanced back at her office just in time to see Angela shut the door and begin a strange energetic dance in the middle of the room; judging by the movement of Angela's mouth, she was also screaming for joy about recent events as well, but Brennan wouldn't like to swear to it.

Right now, all she wanted to focus on was her upcoming dinner with the most important man in her life; her friend's reaction to the news that she was having said dinner could wait until tomorrow.

* * *

As they sat down at their table in the restaurant, Brennan automatically picked up her menu and began to study it, Booth doing the same opposite her; both had agreed in the car that the _serious _conversation of the evening would have to wait until they'd eaten at least the main course to give them one last chance to think things over.

The only problem with the current situation, from Brennan's perspective, was the silence that had now settled over them; both of them might have agreed before coming here that anything relating to the much-overdue apologies that the other needed to hear should be saved for later, but at the same time they couldn't come up with an effective conversation topic to discuss _now_...

After a few moments' silence, Booth sighed.

"This is stupid," he said, putting down the menu and looking at her.

"Oh," Brennan said, a brief flash of pain crossing her face before she stood up. "I understand; I'll-"

"That's not what I meant, Bones," Booth interjected, reaching out to place a hand on her arm as she stood up, a slight smile on his face at her misunderstanding- a smile of compassion where another might have been tempted to make an at-least-teasing joke about her jumping to such a conclusion- as he subtly gestured for her to sit back down. "What I _meant _is that it's ridiculous for us to be this uncomfortable with each other. So it's a date rather than just dinner; so what? We've had these things pretty much consistently for the last five years; does that change just because... well, because a few semantics aren't the same?"

"Well..." Brennan began, before she shook her head and smiled slightly at him. "You're right; this... discomfort _is _a bit foolish..."

"Exactly," Booth said, sitting back and smiling at her. "So, as long we're talking, what did you think of...?"

The conversation progressed fairly smoothly from that point onwards, with only the occasional minor interruption as the two ate their food after it arrived. Both of them shared a few of their more pleasant childhood experiences from back before things with their parents became less pleasant- Booth was particularly amused to learn about a couple of times that Max had gone off on a couple of school trips with his children in his role as a teacher-, and even exchanged the occasional reminiscence about their thoughts on some of their past cases, the conversation varying between the personal and the professional with an ease and fluidity that neither of them could entirely recall feeling on a date before.

It was only after the dessert menus had been placed before them and the few small remnants of their main courses taken away that Booth, looking

"Look, Bones..." he began, looking slightly awkwardly at her, "as long we're opening up about stuff... I'm sorry I started dating Cam without telling you back when she first started working with us."

Brennan blinked.

"What?" she said in confusion. "Booth, you don't have anything to apologise for; you both had a former relationship that you clearly still had feelings about, and we were only partners-"

"I know I don't _have _to; it's just that... I thought you deserved it," Booth replied with a slight shrug. "Looking back, I'm not sure _why _I started it- we'd ended it long before I even started working with you and she was the one who actually got us started up again; I was fine the way things were-, but..."

He sighed. "I dunno... it had been almost a year since my last date, and I guess I was just... y'know, wanting to feel wanted at the time..."

"I can understand that," Brennan replied with a slight nod; she briefly thought about elaborating with similar examples of her doing the same thing, but that just led into thoughts about what she'd done with Hacker that she wanted to put aside and forget as soon as possible. "But Booth, you don't _need _to feel guilty about that; we-"

"Doesn't mean I don't _feel _like I need to," Booth said simply, pausing for a moment before he spoke again. "Just like I think I need to say sorry about Zach."

"Zach?" Brennan repeated, further confused at Booth's sudden shift in the conversation. "What do you have to-?"

"If I'd discouraged him from going off to Iraq instead of just passively _en_couraging him, maybe he-" Booth began.

"_No_," Brennan said, shaking her head firmly as she looked at Booth; as far as she was concerned, Booth apologising for Zach's actions was ridiculous to the extreme. "There is no way that _anything _you did could have had an impact on what happened to Zach, Booth. What Zach did was the result of a whole multitude of factors that we couldn't possibly have predicted or foreseen coming together when he was in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong company; you _cannot _blame yourself for that."

For a moment, the two of them simply sat in silence as they looked at each other, Booth reflecting on what Brennan had just said as she waited for him to respond, before he finally smiled at her.

"Thanks, Bones," he said. "I... I think I needed to hear that."

"You're welcome," Brennan replied, before she lowered her head for a moment, still uncomfortable with what she was about to say, before she nodded resolutely. "On the topic of apologising, I'm sorry I went out with Jared..."

She couldn't help but feel a slight quiver in her throat as she looked up at him, suddenly understanding how Booth had felt regarding Cam; even if he'd never brought it up after the incident was over, that didn't stop her from feeling ashamed of her actions and needing to apologise for them regardless.

"And... that I... gave the impression I believed him," she finished, staring at Booth with a simple open sincerity that she could only hope he understood in full. "Anthropologically, I could defend it on the grounds that he had more immediate access to the 'evidence' than I did..."

She shook her head resolutely as she looked at Booth, forcing that train of thought out of the conversation as she continued speaking. "Whatever my reasoning then, that doesn't excuse what I said to you; I should _never _have listened to him for even a moment... and I've _never _considered you a loser."

"Hey, Bones, you don't have to-" Booth began, reaching out a hand to comfort her.

"I'm also sorry about just... asking you to... donate... so that I could have a baby," Brennan continued, trying not to look at him so that she could avoid the expression of disgust that she was certain would appear on his face at her current confession; if she was going to settle how she felt about Booth once and for all, she wanted to be sure that he _knew _what he would be staying for no matter how she was starting to feel about her past. "I just thought that... I'm not sure _what _I was thinking there; maybe it was the only way I could be _sure _you wouldn't leave me... I was so desperate to make sure that I'd have _something _of you in my life... even if you weren't there for _me_... you'd never leave your child... and then the tumour..."

"Yeah?" Booth asked, his tone giving nothing away about his feelings regarding the 'plan' that she'd just confessed to him; Brennan wasn't about to kid herself that she was totally off the hook after what she'd just admitted to, but the fact that he was still here was at least a point in her favour.

"That dream you had..." she continued, trying to hold back her tears as she dug down inside herself to reveal herself in a way that she'd always been afraid to do so ever since she'd lost her parents, reveal herself in the manner that Booth _deserved _to see her if he was genuinely going to stay, "I was so scared I couldn't live up to your fantasy... afraid of what you might... expect from me because of it..."

"I didn't expect _anything_, Bones-" Booth began.

"Then I was going to visit you..." Brennan continued tearfully, barely even acknowledging what he'd just said; having started her confession, she just couldn't bring herself to stop. "I heard some of the doctors discussing your case... they mentioned that you might have created an 'ideal woman' in your fantasy... the woman just _happened _to have my face, and..."

"And you ran off to Guatemala to give me time to 'clear my head', huh?" Booth finished for her (He wondered how he should feel about the fact that she'd essentially done what Sweets and Cam had later encouraged _him _to do; give him time to confirm how he felt before he committed himself to anything), looking sympathetically at her.

He wasn't sure how _she'd_ felt at that news, but he could imagine how he would have felt if he'd been in her position; thinking that the person you loved might only feel the same way about you because of some screwed-up lump of brain tissue...

"I don't even know why I'm here..." Brennan whispered weakly.

"Huh?" Booth said, looking at her in confusion as she suddenly began to cry again, derailing his train of thought before he could follow it through any further; all that mattered right now was working out what Bones had meant by that last statement.

"I've... I've hurt you so _much_..." Brennan said, her head lowered and her shoulders shaking as she spoke. "You've been there for me... you've trusted me... you helped me solve my parents' disappearance... you took a bulletfor me... you told me you _loved _me... and I just... I just keep..."

Before Booth could stop her, Brennan had stood up and ran from the table towards the restaurant door, leaving him to glance over the menu long enough to pull a few notes out of his wallet to cover the cost- he was probably overcharging a bit but this was more important- before he hurried after her, finally catching up with Brennan despite her head-start as she was about to run around a corner.

"Bones!" he said, grabbing her by the shoulder and spinning her around so that he had a hold of the other one before she could run any further.

"Let me _go_..." Brennan sobbed, her legs shaking so badly underneath her that Booth wondered how she was able to keep standing. "I have to leave... I can't hurt you... I _can't_..."

"Bones, _look at me_," Booth insisted.

For a moment, Brennan couldn't bring herself to follow Booth's request/order, but finally she looked up at him, expecting to be met with the cold stare he'd given her earlier, only to find herself looking into the same warm, compassionate eyes of the man who'd been there for her since that fateful day when he'd been blown up by her fridge simply because he'd wanted to protect her, the man who'd held her when she'd been told that her father had killed her mother, the man who'd been there for her through the most emotionally intense five years of her life...

"You didn't do any of that to be _deliberately _cruel to me, did you?" Booth said, his gaze fixed on hers with no trace of deception in his intent.

"_No_," Brennan replied, shaking her head urgently even as she ever-so-slightly pulled against his grip on her shoulders. "But I-"

"I'm not saying what you've done didn't hurt, Bones, but _intent _is as important as anything else," Booth interjected, his gaze fixed on her as he spoke. "Remember what I told you when you when you shot Epps's assistant; the fact that you killed a guy to do the _right _thing is what makes you different from him."

"I _hurt _you..." Brennan protested weakly.

"Yeah, I get that, and I'm not saying it didn't hurt at the time, but...." Booth began, before he sighed and shook his head, a slight chuckle coming from his lips as he looked at her. "Y'know, for a genius, you really miss some obvious points, don't you?"

"Such... such as?" Brennan asked, swallowing slightly to try and regain control of herself.

"Such as the fact that, leave me to my own devices- by which I mean barring unforeseen instances such as me getting shot or getting sick- and there isn't a _single _thing in this world or the next that could drag me away from you," Booth said, smiling slightly at her as he spoke. "You want to know the real reason it didn't work with me and Catherine, Bones?"

"What?" Brennan asked, a part of her feeling as though she was already aware of what he was about to say.

"She wasn't you," Booth said simply. "I tried to move on at the time, believe me, but I always hit that stumbling-block; Catherine was great, but she could _never _be anything _close _to you. You're not just the standard to me, Bones, you're the _ideal_; if I can't be with you, I can't be in a relationship, _period_."

"But I... I _hurt _you..." Brennan protested weakly, even as she couldn't help but feel touched at his words; to have someone say that she was their first choice like that, even after she'd assumed that Bryar would be a far better match for him on a personal level than she could ever be... even after she'd hurt him so badly...

"No offence, Bones, but after some of the occasions I've been through where people wanted to- and often did- hurt me on _purpose_- admittedly that was primarily physical, but they often did it for a _pretty _long time-, the stuff you've done to me because you're a bit of a screw-up doesn't exactly push you that high up my list of people to avoid," Booth replied, the slight smile on his lips contrasting with the slight pain in his eyes before he shrugged with an at-least-slightly-feigned nonchalance.

"Besides," he continued, his voice softer as he walked forwards slightly so that he was standing in front of her, his eyes fixed on hers as he spoke, "that's the thing about love; it isn't always easy, and sometimes you get some _serious _kicks in the teeth because of it- metaphorically, anyway, although I've definitely taken a couple of kicks there working with you over the years-, but it can also be... unpredictable... unexpected... unreasonable... and, most importantly..."

"What?" Brennan asked, after Booth had simply stood in front of her in silence, a smile on his face that she'd never seen before.

"Unconditional," Booth whispered at her, before he finished his steps towards her and their mouths met, igniting the same spark that Brennan had felt the last time that Booth had kissed her with the exact opposite results.

Whereas before she had pulled away from that spark, this time she welcomed it, wrapping her arms around Booth and holding him to her, revelling in the feeling of his lips on hers, his tongue stroking and caressing hers, the sheer _intensity _of the emotions he was awakening in her making her feel a pure, unadulterated joy that she could never recall experiencing before...

Finally, the two of them separated once again when oxygen was starting to become an issue, leaving Brennan unable to do much more than smile slightly shakily up at Booth.

"Wow..." she said, feeling stupid even as she said it but unable to come up with something better.

"I second that," Booth replied, nodding at her with a slight smile before he assumed a more serious expression as he looked at her. "I'm not saying that... what we've got... is going to be smooth sailing all the way, Bones; what I _do _know is that it's not going to be _anything _if we don't try to have _something_."

"True..." Brennan replied, nodding slightly as she looked uncertainly at him.

"So," Booth said, holding up one finger as he looked pointedly at her, "if we're doing this, I've got one condition I'd like to make."

"Which is...?" Brennan asked, slightly apprehensively.

"No second chances if one of us leaves again," Booth replied simply, his gaze fixed on her as he spoke. "We've coped with a lot to get to this point, Bones, but..."

He didn't finish it, but he didn't have to do so in order for Brennan to understand what he meant; they might have come this far _despite _their 'misunderstandings'- the term might have been an understatement for the messes they'd experienced, but it was the best she could think of-, but if what they'd just gone through emotionally hadn't been enough to convince her that Booth wasn't going to leave her in anything less than extreme circumstances, nothing would.

"I _know _we could be great, Bones, but we need to show that we're _committed _to this," Booth said, staring resolutely at her as he spoke. "The first time one of us acts like an idiot and walks out on this because we're scared, or because we think the other person doesn't get us, or because we think they don't deserve us, or anything like that..."

He shook his head grimly. "That's it; game over. If we can't trust each other that we're _never _going to leave each other after this..."

His voice trailed off after that comment, but Brennan understood what he meant.

"We won't," she said, reaching out to place a hand on Booth's cheek as she stared at him with a small smile. "I... I love you, Booth; I'd never... I _can't_..."

* * *

"I know, Bones," Booth replied, wrapping her in his arms as he held her close, faint tears trickling from her eyes as she held him so tightly he wouldn't be surprised if a rib or two wasn't cracked when he was released...

She loved him.

It had taken her a hell of a long time to admit it- and he still had to sort out the paperwork back at the Bureau to complete his transfer back to the Jeffersonian-, and he still couldn't help but feel slightly bad about the emotional pain he'd caused her while leading up to this moment- just because _she _might argue that she deserved it after what she'd done to him didn't mean he felt the same, even if it had helped to reassure him that she _didn't _see him as worthless-, but right now, all that mattered was that she loved him; everything else was superfluous as far as he was concerned.

It might be corny, but right now, the words of a song he'd heard on the radio a while back were the best summary of his feelings right now that he could think of.

_I don't care who you are,_

_Don't care where you're from,_

_Don't care what you did,_

_As long as you love me_...

It might not make any sense, but whatever she'd done to him in the past out of a misguided attempt to 'protect' him since that last confession...

No matter how much it had hurt at the time, he had never been able to stop himself from loving her, and he couldn't foresee anything happening in the future that would change that resolution any time soon.

"I love you too," he whispered in her ear before he pulled back slightly to kiss her again, revelling in the feel of lips underneath his that he'd never been able to forget since that incredible Christmas two years ago. "I love you too..."

She'd taken him on an emotional rollercoaster these last few weeks, but right now he couldn't care about that; all that mattered was that Doctor Temperance Brennan, the woman who had captured his heart, mind and soul more than any other woman on the planet ever could, had told him that she _loved _him...

Right now, aside from focusing on enjoying the way her lips tasted, the only thing on Special Agent Seeley Booth's mind was how long he should wait to give her time to adjust to the idea of them dating rather than just being partners before he found the time to show her what he'd meant about breaking the laws of physics...


End file.
